At the end of last Wednesday’s knitting update, I was wondering which part of the Lace Panel Sweater to start next. In the event, I decided it was best to do the sleeves, and chose to work the lace panel as a feature just above the ribbed cuff. The design has twelve rows in this area before you start working on the increases, and that was just perfect for three repeats of the lace design. I must say I’m pleased with how this has looks, and now it’s very relaxing to be on the good old stocking stitch again. My aim is for the sleeves to be bracelet length so that I don’t have to run the risk of turning back the cuff which would hide the lace motif.

I also finished the first sleeve of the Slope Rib Sweater and started on the second one, so now I’m working on two sleeves for two different projects turn and turn about. This will sound like a nightmare to any knitters who have visited sleeve island (the place where you sit becalmed as the sleeves fail to grow no matter how hard you work on them). However, these two projects have enough differences to make them pleasant to work on in tandem. The different colours and textures of the wool, the different stitch patterns, wood needles on one project and metal on the other. I don’t think that I will ever be a knitter who enjoys having multiple projects on the go, but this is much better than I would have expected.

One thing you may have noticed, however, is that I am making a great amount of progress on my Lace Panel Sweater and perhaps falling behind a little with the Slope Rib Sweater. I must admit that I’m more drawn to the pale blue wool at the moment. Has the daylight changed? Are we heading into the clearer light of spring? I often find that affects which colours I want to work with. I’ll probably allow myself to finish the pale blue sleeve, which will probably happen today, and then turn my attention to the purple one.

Interspersed with the knitting, I’ve watched another couple of good films. One, in black and white, made in 1939, was a pretty standard romantic comedy called “Love Affair”. I must have been in just the right mood for this because I found it kept on drawing me further and further in – first they were on an ocean liner, then they were at a Mediterranean villa, then New York, then it started to snow, and when I realised it was all going to resolve itself on Christmas Day I was an emotional wreck! The second film was much more modern (by my standards, almost up-to date!) – “The Lost City of Z”. The slightly H Ryder Haggard feel of the story, together with some really good characterisation, made this film intriguing. Sometimes I really don’t care what happens to characters; in this one I was quite shocked by the fact there was no final, comforting answer.

So now I’ve done a Monday knitting update the question in my mind is whatever am I going to write about on Wednesday?